The government is to phase out the 18 percent preferential savings rate for retired public-sector employees over a period of six years, Vice President Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁) said yesterday.
In a radio interview, Chen said that the government plans to lower the 18 percent interest rate in stages over six years.
For people taking monthly retirement payments, the rate will be adjusted to 9 percent in the first two years after retirement, then to 6 percent in years three and four and 3 percent in years five and six. There would be no preferential interest rate after that, he said.
Photo: courtesy of Super FM98.5
However, to care for less-well-off retirees, the 18 percent preferential rate would remain for people below a salary floor, which is to be set at either NT$25,000 or NT$32,000 (US$791 or US$1,013) a month, pending further discussions, he said.
Pensioners who take a lump sum would be entitled to higher interest rates, Chen said, without specifying the rate.
The 18 percent preferential interest rate for retired military officials, civil servants and public-school teachers was introduced in 1960 when the average income for the three professions was lower than most other careers.
The government originally planned to scrap the preferential rate, but has decided to take a milder approach, Chen said.
“A pension [fund] is like a feeble goose, which has to lay eggs larger than it can handle every day. There will be no more eggs when it cannot stand anymore and dies,” Chen said. “However, a healthy goose that only has to lay normal-sized eggs can continue [to survive] and give birth to goslings.”
Under the pension system, the pension of a person who begins work at 25 and retires at 55 is only enough to cover 10 years of pension payments, Chen said.
By the age of 65, the person would be receiving pension payments covered by others’ contributions, he said.
With a retirement age of 50, due to the nation’s average life expectancy, women can expect to receive pension payments for 33 years and men for 27 years.
To ensure a sustainable pension system, the retirement age needs to be set at 55 and the income replacement ratio lowered from 80 percent to 60 percent, with the pension contributions of employees and the government raised from 12 percent to 18 percent, Chen said.
Meanwhile, amid accusations that the government has not been transparent in its organization of a national conference on pension reform, which is to be held on Sunday at the Presidential Office Building, Chen said the Presidential Office is always “fair and honest.”
Calling on opponents of the government’s pension reform plans to express their opinions at the conference peacefully, Chen said opponents have mobilized protesters in a “warlike fashion,” which is inappropriate conduct in a democratic society.
Although invited to attend the conference, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), the New Party and the Taiwan Solidarity Union have yet to nominate representatives, Chen said, encouraging the parties to participate.
NATIONAL SECURITY THREAT: An official said that Guan Guan’s comments had gone beyond the threshold of free speech, as she advocated for the destruction of the ROC China-born media influencer Guan Guan’s (關關) residency permit has been revoked for repeatedly posting pro-China content that threatens national security, the National Immigration Agency said yesterday. Guan Guan has said many controversial things in her videos posted to Douyin (抖音), including “the red flag will soon be painted all over Taiwan” and “Taiwan is an inseparable part of China,” while expressing hope for expedited “reunification.” The agency received multiple reports alleging that Guan Guan had advocated for armed reunification last year. After investigating, the agency last month issued a notice requiring her to appear and account for her actions. Guan Guan appeared as required,
A strong cold air mass is expected to arrive tonight, bringing a change in weather and a drop in temperature, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The coldest time would be early on Thursday morning, with temperatures in some areas dipping as low as 8°C, it said. Daytime highs yesterday were 22°C to 24°C in northern and eastern Taiwan, and about 25°C to 28°C in the central and southern regions, it said. However, nighttime lows would dip to about 15°C to 16°C in central and northern Taiwan as well as the northeast, and 17°C to 19°C elsewhere, it said. Tropical Storm Nokaen, currently
PAPERS, PLEASE: The gang exploited the high value of the passports, selling them at inflated prices to Chinese buyers, who would treat them as ‘invisibility cloaks’ The Yilan District Court has handed four members of a syndicate prison terms ranging from one year and two months to two years and two months for their involvement in a scheme to purchase Taiwanese passports and resell them abroad at a massive markup. A Chinese human smuggling syndicate purchased Taiwanese passports through local criminal networks, exploiting the passports’ visa-free travel privileges to turn a profit of more than 20 times the original price, the court said. Such criminal organizations enable people to impersonate Taiwanese when entering and exiting Taiwan and other countries, undermining social order and the credibility of the nation’s
‘SALAMI-SLICING’: Beijing’s ‘gray zone’ tactics around the Pratas Islands have been slowly intensifying, with the PLA testing Taiwan’s responses and limits, an expert said The Ministry of National Defense yesterday condemned an intrusion by a Chinese drone into the airspace of the Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) as a serious disruption of regional peace. The ministry said it detected the Chinese surveillance and reconnaissance drone entering the southwestern parts of Taiwan’s air defense identification zone early yesterday, and it approached the Pratas Islands at 5:41am. The ministry said it immediately notified the garrison stationed in the area to enhance aerial surveillance and alert levels, and the drone was detected in the islands’ territorial airspace at 5:44am, maintaining an altitude outside the effective range of air-defense weaponry. Following
RSS